Egg Drop Science Experiment for Kids

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My 3 and 5 year old children are really starting to get into science, especially FUN science. With Easter coming up, I thought an EGG DROP SCIENCE EXPERIMENT would be a big hit, and boy was it ever! We had so much fun and it was very much a child-led activity. It was also great for promoting critical thinking and problem solving!

Introducing the Egg Drop Experiment

First, I asked the kids what happens if you drop an egg. They told me it would break. I asked if they’d like to see what actually happens when an egg gets dropped. Their eyes lit up! I could read their little minds: ”Make a mess that Mom approves? Okay!”

I retreived an egg from the refrigerator, allowed Luke to stand up on the side of the bath tub, and with a big “3-2-1″ from all of us, he dropped the egg! It, of course, splatted into the tub. The kids LOVED it!

I asked them, “Is it possible to drop an egg without it breaking?”

The kids said, “No way!”

I probed a little more. ”Are you sure? There’s no way at all?”

Finally my 5 year old said, “Well, if an egg had armor it wouldn’t break when it fell.” Bingo! I told him that was a great idea, and asked the kids if we could try making armor for the eggs to protect them? They heartily agreed!

Preparing the Egg Drop Experiment

Once we figured out that we were going to try to protect the eggs while they fell, we walked around the house gathering various things we thought might protect the eggs. We ended up getting plain (computer) paper, coffee filters, a cloth napkin, brown packing paper, two different lengths of bubble wrap (for a single layer wrapped egg and a multi-layer wrapped egg), an empty cardboard box, and a cardboard box stuffed with thin plastic packaging. Carefully we wrapped eggs in each different material and used just enough clear packaging tape to hold each one together.

Making Hypotheses

I grabbed a piece of paper and quickly jotted down the various egg wrappings we had created. Beside each one I asked Luke and Lilah what they predicted would happen when we dropped the egg. Would it break or not break? I recorded all of their hypotheses on the chart.

Doing the Egg Drop Experiment

After we had hypothesized, we gathered up all of our eggs and headed to the bathroom. You could also do this experiment outside, but if it’s cold or rainy, the bath tub is the PERFECT place to do this experiment because any mess wipes right up and you have a water source available right there for clean-up!

I helped the kids one-by-one to stand on the side of the tub to drop one of our packaged eggs.

We followed the order we had recorded on our sheet and I reminded the kids each time of what they had predicted before dropping. After the drop, I’d carefully cut away the tape and let the kids unwrap the egg to see if it was broken.

The first several eggs did break!

We recorded each result on our chart.

And then finally we had one egg that didn’t break. The kids were ecstatic!

Following this we had a mixed bag of failure and success.

Results of the Egg Drop Experiment

All-in-all, we tested 8 eggs and managed to save 3 of them. We found that packing paper, multi-layer bubble wrap, and the cardboard box with plastic material for filling made for the best egg protection.

We talked about how if we were going to mail something that was breakable, what materials would be good to use and which ones wouldn’t be.

The kids had so much fun with this experiment, and it is really an all ages experiment! I remember doing Egg Drops in science competitions throughout middle and high school off of tall bleachers. And just recently my husband’s work did a competition…but there’s was to protect an egg dropped off of a 6 story building! Here’s a video to show one of the contraptions where the egg survived the 6 story plunge:

The Egg Drop Science Experiment makes for a great INDOOR activity on a day you need something fun and engaging to do! Or a fun outdoor activity! The older the kids, the more challenging you can make the activity — by letting them come up with their own egg protection designs or by raising the height of the fall for the egg.

12 comments to Egg Drop Science Experiment for Kids

What a NEAT idea. I think my girls would love this! Not sure if hubby would like all the egg waste though. Even so, I am going to pin this for future use.
Thanks for sharingkewkew recently posted…Sunday Photo Round-Up: March 31, 2013

I’m not a fan of wasting food either, but all-in-all we only broke 6 eggs, and if I had thought of it, we probably could have used them for scrambled eggs because the majority just cracked and didn’t all out splatter except for that first example egg. They very easily could have been salvaged!

You could always put the eggs inside a plastic baggie then inside whatever protection you made. I did this and dropped them in the school hallway. also a good way to save the eggs for breakfast… just pick out the shell (most only cracked, like you said) and scramble away!

I think my children would love this experiment, especially my four year old who frequently goes, “I have an idea!” She can have a ball of a time coming up with all sorts of egg protection!Felicia recently posted…File Folder Games

[...] a problem to the kids and have them create an experiment. We recently did a child-led egg drop science experiment that the kids talked about for a week! This is a great way to introduce the scientific process is a [...]